The World

The Pentagon awarded $14.2 million in "Star Wars" contracts to British organizations, the largest to foreign groups since President Reagan ordered research on space-based missile defenses in 1983. Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger and his British counterpart, George Younger, announced the awards in Washington. The larger of the two awards is a $9.9-million contract to the British Defense Ministry to study possible use of "Star Wars" technology against missiles in Europe. The second is a $4.3-million award to Culham Laboratories for work on the neutron particle beam, one of the weapons under study.